Static
by rNgDragon
Summary: The hacker hadn't been joking when she said he would see a familiar face. The lights on the cyborg's body steadily shone a dim purple, easily relating back to the hacker in question. Everything that she owned was a shade between pink or purple, a cruelity he now thinks of the man in front of him. Inspired by sarcasticasides' hacked!genji au.
1. suppressant

The hacker hadn't been joking when she said he would see a familiar face. In fact, it could almost even have passed off as a threat; the quiet glimmer in her eyes and the unsettling smirk that Sombra never seemed to drop. She knew something and seemingly always had a way to get under his skin. If she wasn't so useful, Akande would have killed her already.

The automated door clicked; unlocking and sliding to the side, revealing a dimly lit room, holographic projections flashing along the metal sheen of the wall. A transparent cross-section of a building stood at the center of attention at the middle table, casting an almost eerie glow throughout the rest of the room.

But his attention was focused elsewhere, on the cyborg standing there, palms pressed flat against the glass paneling, fingers splayed out over the neat little holograms.

Akande has taken a step back in surprise, alarmed by the appearance of the cyborg in the room, until he noticed the vacant look in his eyes and the purple LEDs glossing over his golden irises. Genji Shimada just kept staring, his gaze fixed loosely at the wall, not even acknowledging his presence.

A familiar face, Sombra had said. A familiar face indeed.

He watches in silence, half curiously and half fascinated of what and how the hacker had been able to accomplish this. The lights on the cyborg's body steadily shone a dim purple, easily relating back to the hacker in question. Everything that belonged to her was a shade between pink or purple, a cruelty he now thinks of the man before him.

He might have mistaken Genji as an omnic the first time, unsure of the fluidity and calculated way of how he moved was either too humanoid for a robot, or highly advanced programming which could predict and simulate the thoughts of a human. But no, the mask had been discarded to the side, only a hands-width away from the cyborg's grasp. The usual green slit cutting across the length of it was blank, otherwise, he knew it would parallel the dark lights that emitted from his body.

Akande stepped closer, his arm moving of its own accord to rest in the air above the cyborg's shoulder. He caught himself last moment, taking a respectful step back as Genji abruptly turned, locking his gaze with the unnatural light replacing his irises. He stared, curious of where the source of the light could emit from as he watched the cyborg's pupils dilate wide open, finally focusing his bleary gaze on an object.

There was something in there. The look.

He could see the strain of life holding onto in his eyes. If he looked past the purple projections, the brown of his iris shone through, bringing forth the cyborg's pain. He noticed the dark lines circling bags under Genji's eyes; and the way his synthetic jaw clenched hard against his upper human one. The scars cutting across his features were twisted, screaming in an unspoken agony.

The pain. He knew it all too well.

Sombra liked to play around, teasing him with her connection with technology. His arm was mainly one of them. Oh, how she loved to see his confusion or surprise when his prosthetic acted up. He feels the sudden, sharp flare of pain in his missing arm as the nerve endings are cut and taken over. He watches as his arm moves without his acknowledgment as if it is not even connected to him. It feels strangely disconnected as if an outside source had taken over his arm, like it has been.

But she only ever makes it last a few milliseconds, maybe till even a single second. Never more, never less.

Sombra was smart. She knew how far she could push it before she had to back away. He would simply swat her away in annoyance afterward.

But now his thoughts travel back the cyborg standing in front of him. He imagines that pain, but amplified for however long she had taken control of Genji's body. He imagines how long he must have gone without being in control. But most of all, he imagines how she keeps his lips sealed tight, not even allowing him a single thought of releasing whatever was surely building inside of his head.

The solitude of his cell had haunted him even after he had been released from it. His anger had built, but he had held it down, building and building till the day he snapped; the day he had punched his way through the concrete walls that held him.

He knows the pain, or at least half of it. No, but he doesn't know how it is to be trapped inside of his own body. Doesn't know how it feels to be unable to vent his frustration. Doesn't know how it feels having tape permanently over his mouth, controlling what leaves his lips.

He feels a quiet pang of sympathy for a split second until it was smoothed over by the thought of the previous time he had encountered this very same cyborg.

Akande remembered the flying little discs of green light arcing from where their owner had been just a split second ago, and easing his arm up in time to block them from cutting into his body. And the time traveling girl. The cyborg had distracted him and she moved in and fired then vise-versa. They had gained ground and closed in, surrounding him.

He had thrown his whole weight into a single strike, his gauntlet sending tremors and shockwaves through the ground. The ground had deformed, concrete tearing and rising from the impact. Tracer flashed away from it, all the debris missing her, but the cyborg was not so lucky; directly in the path of the attack, launching him into the sky. Genji had risen high with it, a car chasing his path. Akande followed as well.

Seconds before the car could have impacted, a green flash of light rippled in the middle of the car. A silver blade embedded with a green light came clean through, parting the two halves of the car and revealing the cyborg.

Akande was ready. His fist swung forward, connecting square into Genji's chest. There was a moment of stillness; he heard the sound of the cyborg's chest contracting, wires snapping, and the groan of the metal frame bending to his force.

He struck a graceful little bird out of the air, watching the cyborg thrown from the impact into the ground, skidding over and over on the pavement. Genji smashed to a stop against the side of the car, struggled to get up before the mess of his body sparked and gave up, and he fell again.

Good.

He landed, almost laughing at the comical way Tracer's mouth had fallen open, a soundless cry for her metal friend. Her eyes swung to him immediately, narrowing between the orange-tinted goggles before she disappeared in a flash of blue. Her legs moved in a blur of orange, leaping from side to side, her guns dealing out stinging blows to his back.

Until he had caught her, ripping the metal contraption from her chest.

He had watched in satisfaction as she flashed in and out of time, finally putting her annoyance to an end. He stood there, waiting, still holding onto the sizzling, flashing pieces he had tore from Tracer's mechanical heart. The ape watched him through his ridiculously small glasses.

But he had gotten too cocky. Much too cocky. He hadn't expected the ape to do- whatever he did. The ape- Winston, he was called- had met his gauntlet head-on, roaring so loud that the sound resounded back and forth through his head. Akande was surprised by the strength of which the ape hit with. His gauntlet had shattered, metal fingers breaking and twisting.

It should have been a fair fight after that. He had heard the sounds of the bones in Winston's furry fist break as well, yet he had fought like it hadn't even hurt.

Akande had misjudged him. Misjudged him and the rage he had purposely coaxed from him, taunting from his higher ledge as they both watched Tracer blink out of existence. He had made a mistake, and had been met with a pair of cuffs and detainment for several years, up until now.

He had waited, months- years. His patience was rewarded at last, again within the ranks of Talon. After his escape, he had easily finished the job Widowmaker and Reaper failed to do: retrieve his gauntlet. He was so very thankful to find it in one piece and functional. Seemingly, the scientists couldn't help themselves but to put it back perfectly together just for the purpose of display.

But now, he watches the cyborg with a cold, hardened stare. He can see his despair and the building madness of a caged animal within Genji's gaze.

The door behind him hissed then slid open without a sound. It was like the sound shut off a light inside of his head. The cyborg's gaze broke contact with him, becoming glassy and unfocused, sinking into whatever hell Sombra had created for him. Genji was gone again, his consciousness collapsing under the weight of his experiences of the past -however many days or even weeks this had gone on.

It definitely was not the first, seeing how Sombra was confident enough to leave him alone in a room full of computers which could access the outside world.

Akande turned, meeting the purple stare of the hacker in question. The door slid shut behind her, a muffled thud breaking the silence between them. Her calculating eyes searched his, looking for anything that could betray his thoughts on the matter. She broke the continued silence first.

"Well, what do you think?" Sombra looks away, sweeping her bangs to the side before her gaze met his again. " _Impresionante_ , no?"

"Taking control of his body and using him as a vessel?" He replies evenly. "No, I do not."

She scoffs in return, rolling her eyes with a tilt of her head. "It isn't much difference with what you did with the spider lady," Sombra counters, picking at the edge of her gloved nails. "In fact, I can almost say they are one in the same; until I make him kill someone he cares for, anyway."

Akande watches her, careful to keep his expression flat and steady. "The same? No. I at least gave her the option to forget. You? You are holding a time bomb. If he ever gets free we will have no control of what would happen." He remembers the look in the cyborg's eyes. He was still very much there, under the madness and drugs- or whatever the hacker had done to him. "Amélie is gone for sure. Genji is not. You keep him caged there. Why not end it? At least I feel enough mercy for that."

Sombra laughs at that, faking doubling over and clutching her stomach. "Amélie? No, she is far from gone. You tell yourself that to put yourself to sleep at night. We both know that she remembers her husband and visits the place of his death. And bringing her to the castle? Not a wise move if you wish to keep her from remembering." She shakes her head at that. "No, Mister Ogundimu. We are one in the same; monsters."

She leaves him with the thought, strutting over to Genji and sweeping his mask off the table. "Hello, Grumpy. How have you been today?"

Genji doesn't answer, but he sees the cyborg's jaw clench tighter on his otherwise impassive face. He turns to face her slowly, his gaze meeting Akande's as a last desperate prayer.

 _Help._

"Not very talkative, are you today?" Sombra snorts. "Oh, I'm sorry. I forgot." Her hand traces his jaw and his head stiffly jerks away. "You haven't earned the right to talk again."

Genji's eyes were still locked with his. Watching. Waiting.

 _No,_ he thinks. _It is good to have someone like the cyborg on his side rather than against, but there is a tinge of pity that it was not by choice._

Sombra cups his jaw again, tilting his head down and her as she replaces his mask, returning those accusing eyes back to a blank solid line.

Genji pulls away, making a single forced step backward as his arm involuntarily raises half an inch, the fingers curling towards the center of his metal palm. The metal joints shook as they were opposing a force much greater then it could exert. Sombra raised an eyebrow at the cyborg's show of resilience, before it had finally collapsed, his arms loosening and lowering back to the side.

Sombra simply snorted and turned, heading back toward the door, but he kept his eyes on Genji. The cyborg's head was lowered, gazing into the ground. His neck tilted a fraction of an inch, his blinding purple visor staring hate that seemed to emit from his entire body.

Who knew a blank faceplate could convey so much emotion?

 _Are you angry?_ Akande steps forward, admiring the cyborg's unrelenting will. He knows that he will not be easily broken as Amélie. _Good. I liked your temper._

He turns and follows Sombra out the door, just as people started to file into the meeting room. He could feel the cyborg's gaze burning holes into his back, yet he walks away and doesn't return it.


	2. fade

The world is dark and comforting. He breathes, counting the quiet beats of his heart. _Fifty-four, fifty-five, fifty-six, fifty-seven- He breathes._ The colours of the room are too sharp- too blinding. It hurts his mind to focus for too long, and he's content to just slip back into the dark again. The colours blur together, getting softer and rounding at the edges until everything is just a dark purple haze.

Genji is floating somewhere, far above his body. He's breathless, out of control, yet here he feels no need to be in control. A calm settles over him, soothing the strange ache in his mind. He watches everything happen helplessly, like a movie. Powerless to do anything, but content to just watch; wanting and waiting to see what would happen next. The dark wraps around him in a smothering blanket, keeping him warm as he watches the play by play. Snippets of movement and conversations reach his senses, slowly drawing him back.

The world is blindingly colourful. The stabbing blue-lined holograms fill his vision and bathe everything in its light, yet everything he sees is tinted purple.

He hears a name- _his name_. Shimada. And another. _Lacroix._ What were they talking about? Did they need him again?

The sounds are too quiet and they fall on deaf ears. He's too far away, straining to listen to conversations that are kilometers below him. There! The wind picks up and he hears words that float up to him. A country. Gibraltar. Something about watching it? Another name.

 _McCree._

He remembers it... It sounded familiar, bringing back memories that made him shiver. The dusty smell of cigars that drag against his lungs. The warmth of lips on his neck. The brush of humming metal down his synthetic back.

More words reach his ears but he's lost interest already, lost in the strange scenes playing before him. _What was this?_

He blinks, whatever he was thinking about fading from his mind. It's too loud all of a sudden, voices countering each other, trying to outmatch each other's decibels. There are people, he now realizes. They point at the blue structure that looks like it's built into a mountainside. A sudden gunshot makes him flinch. He shuts it out, closing his eyes and willing the purple haze to come take him.

 _How long has it been?_ The question burns in his mind. _Has he even been keeping count?_ Yes, yes, he has. _How long?_ It asks, insistent. _He hasn't lost count, has he?_ No, no, of course not. He keeps count. He can keep count. He's good at keeping count.

 _Then how long has it been?_

Four months, one week, three days. Five... five hours.

His body moves, turning and heading at a steady pace. He feels it, the quiet burn that pushes against joints and winces. Why did it hurt? It felt like an exoskeleton that pushed to move, encasing his limbs within it. He grits his teeth, forcing himself to loosen his limbs and move with the insistent push. The pressure lessens, but the pain doesn't go too far.

Genji feels awake, not continuing to float, but not in control. Somewhere in between. The purple haze retreats almost completely, letting his surroundings slip through his foggy mind. He registers the indifferent gray walls moving past him. He stops at another gray surface. A siren rings next to him and he flinches away from the intruding sound. The wall in front of him opens up- not a wall at all. He walks through the now open door and into a gaping hull of a plane. He sits, his fingers fumbling with the straps.

It's quiet again. The consistent humming of the engine is almost comforting. His eyes start to droop, yet he feels another sound- a vibration in the metal base of the plane. His eyes uneasily slip open, locking onto a solitary figure approaching the open port of the plane.

It's a blue lady. She is slim and walks with an unnatural grace that does not belong to a soldier- a dancer maybe. She gives him a curious side-glance and sits across him. She does not smile at him nor does she ask him questions. She just simply holsters her elongated gun and closes her golden eyes. She sleeps.

It's silent again.

The hanger closes. The engine of the plane picks up. Takeoff. He's lifted off the ground, feeling breathless and lightweight. A sound in his head pops, changing the tone of the steady thrumming.

But he relaxes, the tilt of the plane evening out. His head droops, eyes slipping shut. The purple darkness is waiting for him when he leaves again, greeting him in its warm embrace. The hum of the engine fades to the background and he starts to forget about it.

He thinks back to the lady- the... purple? No, she was a blue lady. What about her again?

Huh. He's not so sure. The purple haze makes him feel sleepy, yet he can not sleep. _What was he thinking about again?_

 _How long has it been? He hasn't lost count, has he?_ No, he hasn't. He's good at keeping count.

Four months, one week, three days, six hours.

Yes, he's almost there. _There?_ Like a countdown. A reverse countdown with no end, he thinks, giddy. He sits, feeling himself drift away again. He breaths, feeling his breath steady and even. It's quiet; it's not blinding nor is it loud. He relaxes, thinking about everything and nothing at once.

 _Four months, one week, three days, six hours, thirty minutes._

 _Four months, one week, three days, seven hours._

Something is going to happen soon, he can almost feel it; but he doesn't know what. There's a name. It has to do with it, he thinks. But as soon as it comes to mind, it's gone.


	3. smokescreen

The dark, looming structure was built right into the mountainside, exactly as the hologram had shown. Yet, Genji isn't quite sure if that is where the quiet recollections keep popping in his mind, leading his footsteps across a rocky outcrop that most people would never have dared to cross. A thin line carved into his mind, barely scratching the surface; invisible to the eye but it was there- insistent. He doesn't think about it, following the vague direction towards something that just pulled him along on an invisible string.

He doesn't think about much, does he? _No, not really._

The purple haze had retreated to the back of his mind, allowing him just enough clarity of mind to keep his footing, yet keeping a quiet insistent urge- still here, still here, still, here. He'd almost welcome it, falling behind its dark covers- but that would almost immediately mean falling to his death, off the steep ledge he was clinging onto.

The wind whipped at his back, lashing his ribbon into the air. He kept climbing.

It leads to a cliff, high above any point in the base. A single patch of grass was thinner, almost barren, and he sees a sort of mat over it like someone had visited this place often and had brought it to sit on. Not anymore, though. A spiderweb trailed against the side of it, its delicate strands clinging desperately to the unnatural plastic-like material. Dust layered over it as well, despite the wind. He approaches the mat and sits, feeling like he was intruding on a private area, yet confounded by the familiarity of the motions.

From here, he could see the entrance of the structure, parallel to another building which the purple lady had set up in, but not much else. There were ledges that faced out to the ocean, directly underneath him, he knew. The place she set up had a clear view of them, he realized.

They were... rooms? Genji frowned, trying to catch onto the thought. He doesn't remember seeing them on the hologram. He remembers them from something else. Someone lived in there. But...

His thoughts were scattered into the wind as he carefully leaned forward onto his hands and knees, peeking under the cliff to confirm his suspicions. There were balconies there, doors leading out into a small platform guarded by a thin metal railing. The one closest to him had spatters of blacked ash pressed into the railing. Cigarette butts and the remains of cigars were spilled messily all over the platform.

The smell of smoke curled around him, still fresh.

He stops, freezing in place as he hears a sound directly underneath him. A quiet shift, a scrape of a chair. A leather gloved hand comes into view, extinguishing yet another flame into the railing before the cigarette joins its brothers scattered on the floor. His breathing stops, afraid of alerting the person to his intruding presence as if a little sound could send the entire base into lockdown.

It's a few more seconds until he registers the loud clap of a door closing, the sound of the other person- so close, now gone.

He backs away from the edge, feeling the dark tide pushing and threatening to spill over his vision. He sits back on the surprisingly cushioned mat, silent, feeling his heart beat a little too fast, and breaths, pulling himself from the strange haze settling over his field of view. He is here for a reason... right?

 _What reason?_

Right on cue, his comm crackles to life. He winces; it's too loud, much too loud compared to the calm silence from before. Static runs a blurry line through his thoughts, making him focus on the single sound. The frayed branches of his mind are sharped, twisted into a single cord, and for once, a clear question formulates in his fuzzy mind: _What in the world?_

"Are you done?" The static dies down enough for him to hear her voice. It's foreign the way she rounds the vowels of the words, stretching out the sound softly.

He stares out into the ocean, playing the sound over and over in his head, marveling at the way his thoughts come out clearly. The white noise keeps him from sinking, a lifeline in the opaque purple haze. He only answers when he remembers- he remembered- that she had asked him a question. His answer is curt, dismissive in the same way hers had been.

The blue lady stares up at him through the scope of her sniper, the lens flare reflecting the dying light of the sky behind him as the sun hid behind the rocky outcrop. He watches her delicate fingers move over the side of her head and the static immediately cuts off, plunging him back into the dark.

His thoughts are immediately jumbled as the piercing sound retracts, leaving him swaying from the sudden throbbing in his head. He backs away from the edge, suddenly afraid of falling from such a height. He runs a hand over his mask, right where his forehead should be, gritting his teeth and trying to quell the shaking in his hands.

Genji shivers, feeling the spike of pain as he body tries to force him to move, yet his stays put, his fingers tearing out the grass. The world starts to lose its vivid colour, blurring before his eyes. The purple haze is back, slipping into his mind like a drug and instantly calming him.

It hurts, he thinks. It almost feels if there is someone there that hears him. He feels their presence like a stone in his mind. A hand brushed over his head, fingers tapped against his spine, in time with the humming of his mechanical body.

 _You have to move._

He's not surprised by the answer. He complies, slowly heading back the way he had come, alert for any signs of a tripwire alarm or any people. Getting down is easier than going up, he muses. He's panicky as he quickly leaves his cover to sprint across the barren ground between the warehouse and the main base. The blue lady is there when he gets back, waiting patiently for him. She does not ask where he had gone nor did she ask what took him so long, unlike everyone else. They slip into an abandoned supply room which hasn't seemed to be used since the base had been reoccupied- or, his mind supplies hasn't been used since Winston made the Recall.

 _The Recall?_ The voice asks, the voice he had just come to think as an afterthought, always repeating everything he said.

Yes, the Recall. Winston had... He blinks sluggishly, feeling something tighten at the base of his skull. Intruding fingers pushed into his mind, slipping past his thoughts like a knife and carving a hole in his already fragmented mind. He winces at the intrusion, running his hands against the metal that covered his skull. It leaves as fast as it had come, taking something with it.

Whatever he had been thinking had been lost, feeling that it was continuing to get harder and harder to keep his thoughts in order. But he frowns, looking around the area, forgetting about it already. It looks familiar in a way.

No, he had heard wrong back at... wherever that room he had been in previously. They weren't here to watch something in Gibraltar; they were at Watchpoint: Gibraltar. The pieces started to come together in his mind. They were here for something else.

He sits, drawing his knees close to his chest and resting his aching head against them. He knows that the blue lady is watching him, yet he could care less, closing his eyes and feeling a sense of relief at the purple-hued darkness shifting comfortably around him, giving him space for his mind to wander. He feels the tendrils of it curl around him, cradling him in the safe dark embrace.

 _You should rest,_ it tells him. He never thought of it before, but the voice is soft and soothing. It's slightly feminine with an accent he's sure he has heard somewhere before. _Just go to sleep and let me handle it._

Yes, he should, he agrees, slipping farther and farther from everything.

 _How long has it been?_ The same questions repeating again and again. _Long enough?_

Four months, one week, four days, half an hour. Time swept by so fast since they had landed nearby six hours ago. Six hours, thirty minutes and counting. It had taken time traveling here, emerging from his unconscious slumber and back again as he followed the slim blue lady.

 _Just keep counting._

Yes, he thinks, slipping farther and farther from everything. Images are pulled from his mind, locations, places from the base he had passed. His comm crackles to life, the same soothing voice from before speaking to someone, but it had taken a different tone, much more formal, but he's too far gone to make out what it says.

 _"Yes, the target's confirmed in that room..."_

Last words catch his attention but they don't make much sense to him. He drifts in and out, all the while they sit in comfortable silence, waiting for nightfall.


	4. indifferent

The wind is quiet tonight, a low breeze despite their proximity to the ocean and mountains. Only a whisper of it can be heard through the small opening of the door. It will be a clean shot then. There are small blessings in life, she supposes.

The cyborg next to her hasn't spoken, but then again there isn't much to be said. She watches the way he curls up on himself, his arms coming to hold his knees against his chest. His purple lights pulse gently in the dark, in time with his quiet breaths that had broken the silence of the night.

The action is just so- _human._

She'd seen him hesitate at the clifftop, straining to remember something that he had lost, like so many times she had looked her self in the mirror; or wondered at the grave of a man who bore her name. She was only ever greeted by silence and the quiet ache of something missing in her head.

But she watches him indifferently, with a gaze that is neither caring nor passive. In the end, they'd both would come down to their false natures: weapons controlled by Talon. She just hopes he will not end up too much like her. What used will Talon find from two supposedly unique weapons that would serve the same purpose?

His lights blink and grow brighter, basking the room in his sickly purple light. He's done waiting. Her comm blinks and she presses on it. Sombra informs her that they can move. Their target is moving back to the highest balcony on the cliff face.

She pulls herself up and heads for the door, the quiet whirring if machinery behind her signalling he had done the same. Twilight had settled over the horizon, the sky black and spotted with stars. Widowmaker takes a quiet breath, refreshing from the stale air in the storage room. She spies a small light in the distance, a lonely orange glow.

"That's him," Sombra confirms over the comms. "I'm prepping the transport. Don't take too long."

She brings the sniper up to rest against her shoulder, angling it towards the spect of light in the distance. Her breathing slows as she adjusts the scope of her lens, focusing on the target. There's a lazy wind tonight; it brushes against her spine and sweeps her hair across her back. There's a moment of silence before her finger twitches towards the trigger, slowly and smoothly.

 _"I hope you miss."_

Her concentration snaps as she turns to look at the cyborg. Shimada was crouching next to her, his gaze glued on the target. His shurikens were in hand, though she doubted they would be of much use at this distance. She watched his chest rise and fall with his breathing until she deemed him not threat and turned back to the focus of her scope.

The target hadn't moved a single inch, yet she took the precautions to refocus and scope in. Shimada fidgeted next to her, every shuffle and quiet whir of machinery as he moved distracting her. Her eyes flicked to the side in annoyance. This surely wasn't his first ever target, nor would it be his first kill. There should be no reason to be nervous.

Perhaps he recognized the target? The thought took longer to form in her head than it should have. She took note of his stiffened and tense body, the nervous fidget of the shuriken in his hands, and came to a conclusion: he was indeed nervous because this was his first target under Talon.

The thought of her first target came into his head, Gérard Lacroix, the mystery man that bore the same name as her. She doesn't remember the details of the kill, but knows she had done it. There was a spark of familiarity whenever the name was brought up, but she learned to suppress them.

 _He will learn,_ she thought, her eyes narrowing to focus on the pinprick of light in the distance. A target was only a target after all. A name and a face with no weight attached; she was indifferent to them all.

The sniper felt warm in her hands, in contrast to her cold skin. The curves and edges of it were all familiar to her. She felt the edges of her lips curl upward into a small smile as her finger rested on the trigger. There was a strange stir in her chest, a flutter in her heart. _She felt alive._

She counted the slowed beats of her heart: one, two, three. Her finger squeezed around the trigger.


End file.
